Sutton MP calls for crackdown on Tiger poaching

July 28, 2011 5:24 PM

Local MP Tom Brake has supported a motion in Parliament calling on the Chinese government to crack down on illegal tiger trading, as recent statistics show that there could be as few as 3,500 tigers left in the wild.

According to Tigertime, a movement set up to save the Tiger from extinction, the current rate of decline of the tiger population in the wild could mean that they will be extinct within the next twenty years.

The movement has attracted the support of a number of prominent figures, including actors Sir Roger Moore and Susan Sarandon.

Tom said: "The wild tiger population has decreased from 100,000 to 3,500 in little over a hundred years. We need to reverse this awful trend and preserve the tiger for our and future generations."

Tiger poaching has become a large and lucrative business in China and across Asia. Tigers are poached for amongst others things their bones, organs and fur, which are then used for a variety of products ranging from restaurant delicacies to luxury clothes. They are also ingredients in the traditional medicines which are used by an estimated sixty percent of China's 1.3 billion people.